I am a British author and journalist. I grew up in London in the 1970s and studied at Leeds University, where I also edited the student newspaper. I enjoyed a peripatetic career on a number of Fleet Street newspapers with assignments that ranged from seeking London's best dry Martini to investigating Nazi war criminals who found sanctuary in Britain.

In 1991 I decided to become a foreign correspondent and moved to Budapest to cover the aftermath of the collapse of Communism. I also spent much time in the former Yugoslavia, covering the wars in Croatia and Bosnia. I moved to Paris for a year in 1997 to write a thriller, which eventually became The Budapest Protocol, then returned to Budapest. Over the years I have worked in more than 30 countries and enjoyed some hair raising adventures along the way. I returned to London in 2019. I still write books, I review thrillers for the Financial Times and I also work as an editorial trainer and writing coach.

I've written eight non-fiction books and seven novels, which have been published in twelve languages including Chinese, Japanese, Hebrew and Hungarian. These include the ground-breaking Hitler's Secret Bankers, which exposed Swiss economic complicity with Nazi Germany and which was shortlisted for the Orwell Prize; a biography of Slobodan Milosevic, now regarded as the standard work on his life and City of Oranges, which recounts the lives of Arab and Jewish families in Jaffa, and which was shortlisted for the Jewish Quarterly Prize. Hitler's Secret Bankers and City of Oranges have both been republished recently in new updated editions by Head of Zeus.

Tower of Basel, my investigative history of the Bank for International Settlements, the world's most secretive and influential financial institution, is published in the US and Britain by PublicAffairs. It's quite a story.

I am especially interested in the interface between fact and fiction. Complicity with Evil, my investigation into the United Nation's failure to stop genocide, helped inspire my new thriller series, featuring a smart, feisty but haunted heroine. The Geneva Option, the first in a series of books featuring Yael Azoulay, is published by Telegram in Britain and HarperCollins in the US. You can read one of Yael's adventures for free by downloading The Istanbul Exchange, available here for Kindle and from the publisher, HarperCollins US, in all formats. The Washington Stratagem and the Reykjavik Assignment are the second and third books in the trilogy.

I recently completed a trio of critically acclaimed noir detective thrillers set in Budapest, featuring Balthazar Kovacs, a Gypsy detective in the Budapest murder squad. District VIII, Kossuth Square and Dohany Street are published by Head of Zeus. Kossuth Square was a Times Crime Fiction Book of the Month, while Dohany Street was a Sunday Times Crime Club choice. Do get in touch and let me know your thoughts if you read one of my books – I’m always pleased to hear from readers.